the journey of a twentysomething in New York City living with type 1 diabetes

Keynote.

Last week I received a new gadget in the mail – a Wavesense Keynote meter from the fine folks at Agamatrix.

The box was huge, which surprised me, but inside I found a “lifetime supply” (I think it’s about three months worth of strips), two meters, the software box and some lancets.

The Keynote is about the same size as my Ultra, though it’s a square instead of the Ultra’s curvier look. But the meter cases are almost exactly the same size, so honestly, the size of the meter matters very little. The Keynote is supposed to have higher accuracy, but I have only compared readings a couple of times and both times they were exactly 10 points off from each other, which is pretty good.

One thing I’ve noticed is that the Keynote runs me a little higher when I’m low than the Ultra does, but I haven’t done any scientific testing because my Ultra was never with me when I went low. I plan on taking a closer look at this in the future because having accuracy during a low – and a high – is important. My blood sugar was in the “normal” range when I did my comparison testing, so it’s still to be determined which one is better when my blood sugars are off kilter.

Another plus: this meter takes way less blood than the Ultra, which I’m thrilled about because my callused fingers are not bleeding as well as they used to. I plan on checking out that laser poker from Pelikan at this summer’s Friends for Life conference.

I just got one of these myself (they’re marketed as the iTest up here in Canada). Not sure if I like it or not yet, but I find the readings are occasionally really erratic. The lancets are awesome though.

Having test-driven the Keynote, I can tell you that the numbers may seem like they are higher when you are low, but after doing a fasting blood sugar at Quest, I discovered that the “low” range for the One-Touch is pretty inaccurate under 70 mg/dL (which is disclosed in the package insert if you care to read all of that stuff). This explains why some readings come up as 43 mg/dL or 67 mg/dL yet “feel” exactly the same. The fact is that few meters are very accurate at the low end of the scale, yet virtually all claim accuracy at levels of 800 mg/dL or higher! That’s pretty sad when you think about it, but I’m glad that the Keynote is more accurate at the lower end — that should make it more attractive to those of us with type 1.